[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 65 (Monday, May 20, 2002)]
[House]
[Pages H2641-H2647]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
REGARDING EVENTS OF SEPTEMBER 11
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 3, 2001, the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. McInnis) is
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
Mr. McINNIS. Mr. Speaker, you have to have some patience to be
sitting over here and listening to the last 20 minutes of Democratic
rhetoric. Let us start with a little rebuttal because under the rules
of the House, as you understand, they do not have to yield time and, of
course, they would not yield time so their remarks all tell one side of
the story.
Let us start with the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio). In the
West we would call the gentleman from Oregon on this subject kind of a
Johnny come lately. Where has he been? I noticed he just ran onto the
House floor, still in his Levi's, puts a suit coat on and starts
talking about what the Republicans have not done with a company called
Stanley Works which makes Stanley tools up there in Connecticut and is
trying to avoid U.S. tax by registering with a post office box in
Bermuda. He says nobody has heard anything about this. He acts as if he
is breaking new ice.
The gentleman from Oregon should have signed on to my bill. I have
got the first bill on that to close that loophole. It is a terrible
loophole. I had the chairman of that corporation in my office, and I
gave that chairman a list of the American soldiers that lost their
lives in Afghanistan trying to defend this country and the interests of
this Nation. I said that any corporation that does business in America
has more than an economic interest in this country. They have a moral
responsibility to their community.
{time} 1945
They have an inherent obligation to their country that provides them
with the freedoms and the fruits of freedoms that this Nation offers to
business people.
This country provides the defense for Stanley Tool Company. And, by
the way, Stanley Tool Company, which is registering in Bermuda, has
zero sales in Bermuda. They freely admit all they are going to do is
get a post office box and save $30 million.
What bothers me about this, I think we can all agree on the issue,
Stanley Tool Works, and many of you today, by the way, if you buy
Stanley tools, you ought to quit buying them, because Stanley Tools is
no longer that American company. They will keep all their manufacturing
here, for a while, anyway, but they are going to put that post office
box so they do not have to pay taxes, like any of the rest of you in
this room. So keep that in mind. Next time you go down and want to buy
a tool, you need a tool, do not buy Stanley tools.
What bothers me about the comments of the gentleman from Oregon (Mr.
DeFazio), he comes in here strictly on a partisan issue and starts
bashing the Republicans. I would say to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr.
DeFazio), we have had this bill in place, it is my bill, I know a lot
about it, we have had this bill in place for a couple of months. I did
not see the gentleman at any of the meetings. I have not seen the
gentleman at the Committee on Ways and Means. We have had several
meetings in regards to this tax issue.
For the gentleman to come up to the floor, just like a greenhorn,
that is what we would call you in the West, somebody that pops on the
scene, you know, is kind of fresh to the thing and thinks they know
everything, before the gentleman starts up here giving these
blasphemous words and language and partisanship against the Republican
leadership, the gentleman ought to look up his bill directory, and I
think the gentleman would be surprised. Not only do I have a bill
there, the gentlewoman from Connecticut (Mrs. Johnson) has a bill, and
the gentleman might be surprised there are a couple of people on his
side of the aisle that have bills.
To the best of my knowledge, the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio)
has not been at any of these meetings in regards to our effort to stop
corporations like Stanley Tool Company from incorporating in Bermuda
for the simple reason of avoiding taxes in this country.
So if the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio) would spend more time
working with us on our side, we are the majority. You were the
majority. You could have shut this loophole when you were the majority;
you did not. I hope we as the majority, in combination with people like
the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio) who want to work with us, will
shut this loophole.
The gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio) was correct, it is not fair
to the American people what this corporation is doing. I hope that the
chairman of that corporation who the gentleman from Oregon (Mr.
DeFazio) says will make many, many millions of dollars, and I happen to
believe he probably is correct, I hope the chairman of that corporation
has that list that I gave him of the soldiers who have given their
lives so far. Now, this is up to a week ago. I know we lost a soldier
yesterday. But up to a week ago, those soldiers who had given their
lives so you would be free to do business in this country. I hope that
chairman is having second thoughts ever since the moment he left my
office. My guess would be that he has not.
But the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio), in my opinion, next time
the gentleman wants to start blasting, it is obvious it is a political
year, next time the gentleman wants to start blasting us, he ought to
figure out if we have not already done the work on it.
I think it gives the gentleman a little more credibility to come in
here, not as Johnny-come-lately, but come in here and really come up
with some new information and come up with something positive that will
help us move the ball.
Now, how interesting, I see in regards to the second speaker that
attacks on a very partisan basis and says it is Bush's policy that we
have to rely in the future on foreign oil, how little knowledge that
individual, in my opinion, has on ethanol, for example.
Take a look at I think today's Wall Street Journal. I would ask my
colleague to take a look at that column, on the editorial, guest column
on ethanol. Do you know it takes more fossil fuel to generate the Btus
of ethanol, to provide a gallon of ethanol, than a gallon of ethanol
can give off?
This article points out there is a reason that the people who produce
ethanol use fossil fuels for the generation
[[Page H2642]]
of the ethanol. It is because fossil fuels are cheaper to produce, and
ethanol, in the long run, you are better off to pour the gasoline in
the ground than replace it with ethanol, because you use more gas, more
Btus, to produce less Btus through ethanol.
My colleague goes on and says all we have to do is have alternative
energy. She ignores the facts, either intentionally or accidentally,
ignores the facts of alternative energy in this country. Today if we
took all of the alternative energy known to the world, all of the
alternative energy known to the world, and were able to somehow
magically put it in the United States of America, it would only meet
about 4 or 5 percent of our energy demand. The fact is that alternative
energy is the future of this country, but that future is still 15 or 20
years out there, and, in the meantime, you have got to have oil
production in this country.
Now, if you do not support that kind of thing, then you yourself
ought to quit driving an automobile. You yourself ought to quit
appearing in a Chamber like this, look how many lights are lit in this
Chamber, so you can present your point of view. You ought to quit using
anything that has an oil base to it, which includes, by the way,
prescriptions, medicine, clothes, you know the gambit. Our everyday
life is very dependent on those fossil fuels.
The Republicans have led the way, in my opinion, with the help from
Democrats, and there are a lot of things we have had a bipartisan
effort on, of trying to work off fossil fuels. But before we leave
fossil fuels, we had better figure out something that is going to work.
We had better figure out something that is going to work. And today,
throughout the whole world, as I said, everything that works outside of
fossil fuels, including solar power, would only provide about 4 percent
of our needs.
What I would suggest to my good colleague from the State of Ohio,
instead of coming up here hollering about alternative fuels and about
this President, which is a direct misstatement, about how President
Bush's policy is to remain committed to foreign oil, what my colleague
would be much better, much better off doing is talking about
conservation.
If you want to save energy immediately, it is not alternative fuels,
it is conservation. Put out every fourth light up there in that
ceiling. Drive your car a little less. Do not idle your car. Turn off
your light when you leave the room. Make sure your dishwasher is full
when you wash your dishes. If you want to make a real dent in U.S.
consumption of foreign oil, conservation is the answer, not come up
here with some kind of partisan bashing of the Republican Party, which
seems to be a favorite thing of the Democrats in this election year.
Now I want to move on to another topic. I hope this evening, I
really, really want to spend some time with my colleagues talking about
the land issues in the West. My district is in Colorado. I am very
proud of the State of Colorado. Colorado is a very unique State when it
comes to whether it is energy issues, whether it is water issues or
land issues or forest fire issues. I want to spend some time this
evening talking about that.
But I feel compelled, I feel compelled to come up and give the other
side of the story. And there is something else that I want to give the
other side of the story. Last week as we were about to adjourn,
colleagues, oh boy, guess what happened? We had a media circus around
here. We had a media circus. And I am not trying to be partisan here,
but the fact is, just like this energy thing, just like this Bermuda
tax shelter thing, the Democrats last week were jumping for joy as we
were about to get out of here thinking that Bush knew that this country
was going to be attacked on September 11 and he did nothing about it.
That is, on its face, absolutely unfounded, absolutely ridiculous,
and, in my opinion, scandalous. Show me one colleague, whether it is
the most liberal Democrat we have in the House Chamber, whether it is
the most conservative Republican we have in the House Chamber, whether
it is the one independent or socialist, whatever he is, that we have in
the House Chamber, show me one person, one person in here, that has
ever served in here, that would get information about something
happening like September 11 and would sit on it and do nothing about
it.
There is not a person that holds public office in America, whether it
is the local mayor, whether it is the county commissioner, State
legislator, governor, congressman or senator or the President, that
would get information that September 11 was about to happen and sit on
it, which was exactly the implication the Democrats tried to paint on
our President last week. And guess what happened? You know, they
accomplished their goal.
Here is the kind of headlines we see coming out in this weekly
magazine. ``What Bush Knew.'' One of the senators over there stood over
there with the New York Post, I think, ``Bush knew about September
11.''
You know, the problem we have got, and let us talk about these
briefings and the information we get. I got information not too long
ago from a fortune teller, and she swore to me that there was a bomb
that was going to go off on a cruise ship. I mean, what do you do with
this kind of stuff?
Mr. HASTINGS of Florida. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. McINNIS. I would be happy to yield to the gentleman in a moment,
if he will just give me a couple of minutes, because I would like to
have a conversation about this.
I am very upset about this. I am trying to say come on, instead of
running right over here, and I will tell you, the minority leader did
not even have time to put his suit coat on before he was over there
preaching about what did the President know? We need to have a task
force. The United States Congress ought to get a task force to find out
what the President knew, when he knew it.
Look, we are not investigating the President. Why are we trying to
eat our own? The President did not know September 11 was going to
occur. For God's sake, he is a Texan. Have you ever seen a Texan that
knew a fight was coming that did not stand up to give the first slug?
He did not sit there. He did not have the information September 11 was
going to happen.
Now, we all wish that our intelligence network would have been
better, and it is always easy, it is always easy after a fire to figure
out where the fire trucks should be, and it has never failed. I used to
be a police officer, and I can tell you every serious crime I ever
investigated, I would have people come up as we were doing the
investigation that would say, you know, I told them there was going to
be a murder over here in this neighborhood. I told them they were going
to have a car accident at this intersection and they needed to put more
traffic lights in here. I told them this school child was going to get
hit and they needed to have intersection guards 8 hours a day instead
of 7\1/2\ hours a day.
It is always easy to second-guess. But what does this do to our
country, what does it do to our Nation, when on a Friday we can get a
little partisan pool of people speaking up, and the next week it leads
to these kind of headlines? What do you think the foreign press does
with that kind of stuff?
We have a war to fight here. We ought to stick together, instead of
coming up with this hodgepodge stuff about, well, Bush must have known,
and Congress ought to be privy to all of this intelligence. Oh, yes,
see how long a secret could remain if you had a task force made up of
congressmen with highly sensitive material.
Let the President do his job, and rest assured, not one Democrat or
not one Republican in the Senate or in the House or any level of
government would have sat on information that said you are about to
lose 3,000 of your citizens on September 11, and say, well, let us put
it in this drawer. I do not want to act on that.
I would be happy to yield to the gentleman.
Mr. HASTINGS of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I thank my distinguished
colleague from Colorado for yielding. I understand the gentleman's
concern and passion.
I would just like to share with the gentleman that some of us feel
the same as does the gentleman, and that is that the President would
not have sat on information, had he known.
My criticism, and I have been critical, and I might add I think it is
legitimate, is the way they choose to do business in secrecy, and that
is why
[[Page H2643]]
some of us call for an independent commission such as the Kerner
Commission or the Watergate Commission to go forward and make an
investigation in this matter.
Finally, I do genuinely feel that most Democrats do not impugn the
integrity of the President. I certainly do not. But I do believe that
in this instance, with information that was available, not to the
President's desk, but the CIA and the FBI, that they did not serve him
well by coordinating that information, for had he had the information,
he may have acted in a different manner.
I thank my colleague very much for yielding, and I will do likewise
when I get an opportunity.
Mr. McINNIS. I would like to ask the gentleman if he would stay
around. I have the gentleman from Florida that would like to join in
the conversation.
Mr. HASTINGS of Florida. Does the gentleman mean my buddy, the
gentleman from Florida (Mr. Foley)?
Mr. McINNIS. The gentleman's buddy, the gentleman from Florida (Mr.
Foley).
Mr. Speaker, I think we can have a good, legitimate conversation
right here. Let me tell Members, the gentleman is well spoken and well
thought. I agree with the gentleman, I do not think the President was
well served. I do not think the dots were connected that maybe could
have been connected. That is not my point here.
My point is for people to come out here, and I agree with the
gentleman, not all the Democrats did this, but the gentleman would
agree with me, I think, it was your minority leader in that room over
there, talking to the media, what did the President know, when did he
know it, et cetera, et cetera.
The implication of that, and, of course, one can see what the
implication of it is as in Newsweek and all the newspapers throughout
the weekend. That is what concerns me.
First I will yield to the gentleman from Florida and then we can just
kind of all join in, if you do not mind. Let us talk about what level
of intelligence we should put out here in the U.S. Congress.
My concern is that several of these memos, for example, may release
innocently, may release the name of individuals, or somebody brighter
than us can connect some dots out there and we are going to blow the
cover of people, like Condaleeza Rice says, who are trying to protect
these people. So I would look forward to just a few minutes, if the
gentleman does not mind, to talk constructively about, okay, what
should our role be and what, by necessity for the security of the
people of this Nation, has to remain secret with the President and
cannot be disclosed with 535 Members of the Congress.
I yield to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Foley).
{time} 2000
Mr. FOLEY. Mr. Speaker, let me underscore the comments of the
gentleman from Florida (Mr. Hastings); I agree. I think we need to find
out what the agencies knew at the time and why they were not, if you
will, cross-pollinating that information, because that is one of the
problems we have to review.
What I take umbrage with is I think there was a certain amount of
glee in some of the voices here in this Capitol because they had sensed
that finally, they thought they found a weakness in the President to
exploit for political purposes. That is what troubled me. I sense that
we do have a lot of work to do, and the gentleman from Florida (Mr.
Hastings) is on the Select Committee on Intelligence; and he probably
is privy to a lot more than I.
We do have to find out the failures of the FBI, the CIA, Border
Patrol, Immigration and Naturalization, student visas. I mean, we have
a tremendous amount of activity that we have to undertake collectively
as Democrats and Republicans. But I just in my heart of hearts was so
startled when we left here last Thursday. I know politics, believe me.
Both sides play it; our side played it in the prior administration, and
I am sure that when one is the target of it, one becomes somewhat
anxiety-ridden, as I was, over the weekend.
I cannot tell my colleagues how much more distressed I became as the
days went on when I felt in my heart that individual Members had
actually not just speculated, but impugned the President, suggesting
that he not only knew, he almost knew the date, time and sequence of
events. That is what I found startling. I thought that was launched
strictly to weaken him up and to potentially create the political
atmosphere that we currently find ourselves in.
Mr. McINNIS. Mr. Speaker, I might add that the President himself,
President Clinton, our previous President, his comments were when they
asked him, what do you think about these reports, he said, it was
nothing to do with intelligence. He said, generally what those reports
are used for is public sources to speculate on what bin Laden might do.
A lot of that is pure speculation.
Our government every day, as the gentleman from Florida knows,
especially on the Committee on Intelligence, we get thousands,
thousands of reports every day about this could happen, that could
happen; and I have had a number of my colleagues, and then I will yield
to the gentleman from Florida, not my colleagues, but a number of
citizens from Colorado who have come up and said, look, I think they
are going to get our water supply here, or I think they are going to
blow up the tunnels on the mountain.
I yield to the gentleman from Florida.
Mr. HASTINGS of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I especially am appreciative of
both of the gentlemen, and I thank the gentleman for yielding. I know
my colleague's district abuts mine, and we have 50 percent of all of
the vegetables grown in the United States, or grown in my and the
gentleman from Florida's district. So when the gentleman talked about
the failure to cross-pollinate between two of our agencies responsible
to report to the President, I know he knows that from agriculture, our
cross-pollination.
I always say that for humor, I say to the gentleman from Colorado. I
want the gentleman to know that I think the Vice President was correct
when he said that we need to lower the volume. But I think the Vice
President is incorrect when he advises the President that this matter
should not be made known, particularly having to do with the briefing
that he received; it could be appropriately redacted. The gentleman
from Florida (Mr. Foley), our colleague that is involved in this
colloquy, was involved in the Florida legislature when we passed the
sunshine law in the State of Florida. And do my colleagues know what?
The executive branch of government moaned and groaned, and they were
Democrats in the executive branch then, they moaned and groaned all the
way to openness.
When I go with the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Weldon) next week
in Russia and in Beijing and in Korea, do my colleagues know what we
are going to say to those people? That they should be transparent with
reference to their government and that they should have openness. The
one thing I caution is, and I think the gentleman from Colorado got it
right, that a media circus can develop; and those of us who serve our
own egos find ourselves in a position of being consumed by the media.
That Newsweek report did not come from the gentleman from Missouri (Mr.
Gephardt); that came from the minds of some editor who quoted what the
gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Gephardt), as the gentleman from Colorado
correctly pointed out, said.
I thank the gentleman so much for yielding, and I must take my leave;
but I will come back another time to discuss this matter with the
gentleman.
Mr. McINNIS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman; and I would say to
the gentleman, he is a member of the Committee on Intelligence, and if
he does not mind staying for a couple of more minutes, maybe the
gentleman could very briefly advise the rest of us of the differences
in the secrecy levels, we are classified top secret, the secrecy levels
between the gentleman from Florida and I. I take some comfort in what
the gentleman is saying as far as it goes with the Committee on
Intelligence, because the gentleman is trained; the gentleman knows he
cannot do that. But when it goes beyond to the general body, our life
rotates around the media; and that is where the media circus starts. So
if the gentleman would just explain a little for the rest of us
[[Page H2644]]
the difference between his secrecy and my secrecy.
Mr. HASTINGS of Florida. First, I appreciate the continuing
compliment, and I do likewise. I want the gentleman to know that a
month ago I took leave from the Committee on Intelligence to allow the
gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Cramer), our colleague, to go on the
committee. That does not mean that all that time before then that I was
not a full member.
To answer the gentleman specifically, there are 1,000 people that get
a general report on a regular basis that are in the loop, so to speak,
about classified information. There are 20 individuals who get a higher
clearance and a more detailed and specific report. The report that the
President of the United States receives, unless the President
determines, and those determinations are made by him and his advisors,
are not to be made public, nor at any point in time are they to be
revealed unless they become unclassified. And there is dispute about
even that unclassified portion as to whether or not they should be in
the public realm.
What I am saying is that in this case, so many people were victimized
that we would be very wise to take it out of our political hands. The
gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston) who just came in, he and I get
along extremely well until we start talking about politics; and when we
start talking about politics, we have a different point of view.
What we need this thing to be is in the hands of some people that can
look at the CIA and the FBI and, guess who else? They need to look at
the Committee on Intelligence members and all of us and see whether or
not we were discharging our oversight responsibilities. The secrecy
part of it can be handled with open meetings and closed meetings where
necessary. We did it every day in Federal court; every day, and we
protected the source and methodology of our very critical intelligence-
gathering apparatus.
The gentleman has been very generous with his time, and I hope I get
an opportunity to do likewise.
Mr. McINNIS. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman joining in on a
constructive conversation during Special Orders.
Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Kingston).
Mr. KINGSTON. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate joining the gentleman from
Colorado and the gentleman from Florida. I wanted to speak about this
notion of an independent investigation, which I think, unfortunately,
if we look at those who are supporting that, Senator Daschle, the
gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Gephardt), there is a real partisan
question, along with Senator Lieberman, for crying out loud. Senator
Lieberman, incidentally, is actually on the committee and does not show
up. That is a matter of record. But he is calling for an independent
investigation.
I think there are three reasons we do not need it. Number one, we
already have it; number two, it is going to drain the sources of the
Committee on Intelligence; and, number three, it would become a
political football. And I will explain why.
Since February, and earnestly since January, the chairman of the
House Committee on Intelligence, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Goss),
a Republican, and the chairman of the Senate Committee on Intelligence,
who is a Democrat, Bob Graham, have been talking, and are forming what
is a bicameral, both House and Senate, and a bipartisan, one Democrat,
one Republican chair, investigation of what went wrong on 9-11. They
have hired 100, maybe 200, staffers, all have been given top secret
security clearance. They have the cream of the cream of the
intelligence community together, some of the best minds that are
available; and they have been looking into what went wrong, what
lessons have been learned, what can we do right, what can we do better,
all of the good stuff. So this blue ribbon committee is already going
on, and it is balanced.
Number two, if my colleague can imagine already, there is something
like 184,000 documents that have already been turned over to this
committee, and they have the cooperation and the work of over 200 FBI
agents who are right now working on that. I think it is good for them
to. But what seems to be suggested is that we take even more FBI agents
and put them to yet another committee doing the exact same thing. Well,
somebody has to make sure that the world is being watched and we have
our surveillance going. I would rather leave the soldiers on the
frontline fighting the battle than coming back to the headquarters and
hobnobbing with the desk jockeys, but that seems to be the assertion.
Number three, the other reason we do not need this is that who in the
heck do people in this town think will control this? Congress funds all
committees. It would become a political football because Congress would
ultimately control what decisions are made through the appropriations
process, and what appointments are made through our powers. I am sure
that the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Gephardt), for example, would
have a different view than the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Hastings), a
Democrat who seems to be a little bit more balanced, who just left. I
am sure the gentleman from Colorado and I would have a different view
of who should be on that committee, but Congress would be the ones
appointing it. Then, since we already have this bipartisan, bicameral
committee working, what are we going to do, take the resources away
from them? It is ridiculous. It is purely politically motivated.
Yesterday in Afghanistan, we lost yet another American soldier. We
are really getting down to the tough part of this war, because the ones
who are left in al Qaeda are survivors, they are smaller in numbers,
harder to find, harder to identify. The fact that they are still around
shows something, and so this is not the time for the Democrat
leadership to jump ship with soldiers in the war theater and start
their political sniping. Do they really think that George Bush would
sit on information and knowingly endanger lives of Americans? There are
a lot of Republicans who had some tough opinions of President Clinton,
yet I never heard any Republican say that President Clinton would sit
on information.
Mr. Speaker, if the American people elect somebody in the Oval Office
who would do such a thing, there is also the CIA and the FBI. Is the
gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Gephardt) saying, and he seems to be, that
members of the Select Committee on Intelligence, the CIA, the FBI, the
national security advisors, knew about something and sat on it?
One can play partisan with the President, and that is maybe fair
game; but I think it is pretty low when someone starts picking on
members of the intelligence community, who are nonpartisan, patriotic,
professional men and women.
Mr. McINNIS. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I agree with the
gentleman. I do not think we need another task force. My main focus
here this evening was the allegations and the points that were made by
the minority, frankly, last week as we were getting out of session. If
the gentleman will recall, there was media running all over the place,
the headlines: What did Bush know, as if Bush knew something.
This media circus was fed by the minority leader, frankly, the
Democratic leader on the other side of the aisle. That is not fair
game. I mean, it is so preposterous to think that any Member of
Congress, let alone the President of the United States, who I think has
performed admirably since September 11 in response to September 11, it
is out of line to come up here and for the sake of media and an
election year, start saying, well, the President knew about this before
September 11 and we could have avoided it. As the gentleman knows, we
have a very active Democrat here on the House floor who goes so far as
to allege that the President not only knew about September 11, but let
it happen because he was somehow benefiting from military contracts
that were going to friends of his in the defense contract. This thing
is getting out of hand.
As the gentleman from Georgia has very correctly stated, we lost
another American yesterday or the day before. We have a war going on
here. We have a very capable President. We have a very capable Vice
President, Dick Cheney. We have Condoleezza Rice; we have Colin Powell.
We have our Joint Chiefs of Staff of the military, our military
soldiers, from the private on up. Let them do their jobs.
[[Page H2645]]
{time} 2015
They are not back holding secrets from the American people that would
cause harm to the American people, but by necessity, there are secrets
that the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence knows that we
should not know in order to protect the lives of the American people.
The security of America is number one. I cannot think of a job, I say
to the gentleman from Georgia, and he would agree with me, I cannot
think of a responsibility that is higher in its calling to the
gentleman and I as Congressmen, elected by the people of this country,
I cannot think of any other issue that is more important than for us to
provide for the security of the people of this Nation, not only today
but in the future, whether we talk about missile defense, whether we
talk about the war in Afghanistan.
When we start eating up each other, people would think we were
Siamese fish. Friday or Thursday over here with this media circus going
on, it was like putting 2 Siamese fish in the same bowl together. We
are the same team. Siamese fighting fish are bred to fight each other.
We should not be bred to do that. These allegations against the
President were strictly for Democratic partisan purposes.
As the gentleman from Florida said, not all of the Democrats agreed
with that, and I agree that that is right. So I am not labeling all of
our colleagues, but that is their leader. They need to get him back in
the corral, in my opinion. We need to get on with the business at hand,
which is not creating new task forces or so-called blue ribbon panels
to oversee the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, and then
pretty soon we'll need a task force to oversee the blue ribbon
committee that oversees the task force that oversees the intelligence
force that shares intelligence with the President.
Wake up. Common sense will tell us the American public wants us to
get on with the business of protecting the people of this country and
settling the score, frankly, of what happened on September 11.
Mr. KINGSTON. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will continue to yield, I
think the gentleman is certainly right.
One of the things that is important to remember is that when a
committee is briefed in a classified manner so that that information
does not get outside the room, and they have all taken an oath to that
effect, some of the reasons for keeping that information quiet are not
just to protect our own soldiers on the ground, but the informants in
various places of the world, all of the countries in the world. I am
not sure if they number 170, or something. We have intelligence coming
in from every corner of the globe. We cannot endanger those networks.
But another factor that is equally as important, some of this has to
do with the judicial sensitivity, prosecuting folks. We do not go out
when we are investigating and tell all to the other camp because they
can cover their tracks, so sometimes we just have to be quiet. This
idea that everything has to be on the front page of The New York Times
in order for it to be real is absolutely absurd.
Mr. McINNIS. I might say to the gentleman, The New York Times is not
charged with the protection of the people of the United States of
America. In fact, we saw during the Afghanistan war several reporters,
including Walter Cronkite, were critical of the media because they were
taking too much of America's side.
They are Americans. They are U.S. citizens. But we can see that
several people in the media take it as their responsibility, although
they are American citizens, although they receive all the privileges of
this Nation, that they should be neutral parties.
The fact is, if they want to assume that role, their utmost
responsibility is not to provide for the security of the people of this
Nation. That is our responsibility, and we do it at different levels.
The President obviously has to know secrets. We do not allow
everybody access to the nuclear codes, for example. We allow a very,
very thought-out, delicate system to have that occur, and we do not
have 435 congressmen and 100 senators who have that capability. We
structure this thing.
Last week we saw very quickly where I think several Members were
perhaps envious of the fact that they are not the President; or for
political purposes, they just got out of line. That is what I am saying
tonight, that we have to come back together.
This war is a war that is going to last for a long time. The tough
part of the war has not even begun. We have not been hit twice. We got
hit once. We got hit with the embassies and so on, but I mean since
September 11. We know it is going to happen again. We have to be on our
toes.
On the other hand, we have to be reasonable about this. Every time
somebody calls an office and says, hey, I think they are going to hit
the Sears Tower today in Chicago, if they know that every time somebody
puts an anonymous phone call in that they are going to blow up the
Sears Tower, that the Sears Tower has to be evacuated, they can
paralyze this country.
It is like calling in bomb threats to a school. If we call one in day
after day after day, there are lots of these kinds of things that go on
every day in this country.
What we do, what our responsibility is at the congressional level, is
to make sure we have properly funded and properly provided for the
staffing and properly provided other resources that are necessary for
our Federal Bureau of Investigation and for our intelligence agencies
to go out, pick up the dots, put the dots together, and present those
dots, put together, to the President and to the Security Council and to
our national security adviser, et cetera. That is what needs to occur.
Mr. KINGSTON. If the gentleman will continue to yield, Mr. Speaker,
the other thing is what the gentleman is saying is there is such a
thing as a specific threat. A specific threat is when we know the time
and place and what method of weapon or destruction that is going to be
used against us and we can act very quickly against the specific
threat, if given all the information.
But a general threat, which there must be hundreds of them that go
out each year.
Mr. McINNIS. Thousands.
Mr. KINGSTON. Thousands, it does not give a time specific, a place
specific, or a method specific. So what happens is we are guessing.
Okay, there is going to be something that happens to the water system
in New York. Do we close down all the drinking water that day? That is
a general threat, and what is the practical way out of it? There are so
many things, like the gentleman is saying, are like a bomb scare. The
gentleman will know that the intelligence-gathering system is not
perfect.
I remember that we evacuated on September 11. When we were in the
Longworth Building we were not told actually to evacuate. There was
confusion. In fact, I personally went downstairs to the police and
said, I have some employees here. Are we evacuating? And they said no,
because at that time nobody knew what was going on.
We went outside the United States office buildings, outside of the
Capitol, and we were told that the Capitol had been hit. This was just
the rumor, not by the police, but this was the rumor on the street,
that the Capitol had been hit, the mall area had been hit, the State
Department had been hit, and the Sears Tower. That was the street
discussion, because no one could get out on their cell phones because
all the communication was jammed.
Later in that day, Congress gathered in a safe spot. The gentleman
will remember that. And those Members of Congress who still had their
beepers on that could get the word to gather in this particular
location, we were given our first post-morning of 9-11 briefing. I
think it was about 2 o'clock or 3 o'clock on September 11.
At that time, there were still a few airplanes in the air unaccounted
for. Some of them were off track. Nobody knew for sure what to do with
those airplanes.
We were also told at that time that there were 5 airplanes that had
been involved; that along with the one that had crashed in
Pennsylvania, another one had crashed just outside of Kentucky. That is
the information level that was available at that time to Members of the
United States House and Senate. It is not classified information, but
that is what we were told.
So this is a very inexact science. And again, that was from the best
sources
[[Page H2646]]
to people who wanted to have the best information. So it is not--for
anybody who knows anything about intelligence, they know that we cannot
always trust the sources. It is an inexact science.
For somebody at a time of national tragedy to grab this, this
question, this uncertainty in the name of partisanship is just
disgusting and disturbing.
Mr. McINNIS. Mr. Speaker, we saw it on Thursday. I am telling the
gentleman, we saw when the minority leader, and this was strictly for
political purposes, went out there and did this little media circus.
That is the kind of thing that I speak so strongly about up here.
Let me also point out that we have sources that are bad sources. We
have false rumors. We have people who want to paralyze us by calling in
false alarms.
But the fact is, we have good sources out there. Maybe the most
important key we can talk about here is the necessity to protect the
good sources. The President has access through our intelligence network
to many, many people. I think Condoleezza Rice said it yesterday, that
many, many people throughout the world care about the United States of
America. They have good information to give to the United States of
America, and they share it. Those sources need to be protected.
Those names should not be given to a task force or a blue ribbon
committee here in the United States Congress. They should not be given
to us at all, except under extraordinary circumstances. These sources
need to be protected.
It is a part of the structure of the protection blanket that we are
trying to form over the United States of America and for our allies. It
is just as important as our missile defense system to keep our sources
secure, and we have a structure in place that does it. We have got to
let that structure work, and we have got to refrain from making the
kind of partisan attack that we saw that took place against President
Bush when he was, as our local newspaper in Colorado said, bushwhacked.
Then they went on to say, what did Bush know prior to September 11?
Their conclusion was, very little, let him do his job, get off his
back, and this is nothing but a political distraction.
That is what has happened. That is exactly why I took the podium this
evening. We have to call it as we are seeing it. What we are calling
here is what took place last week was not right. They hurt the efforts
of the country.
It seems to me that apparently there has been some backpedaling by
the minority leader and some of the leadership of the Democratic party,
although I must say there is a colleague from the gentleman's State who
certainly has not backpedaled from her allegation that Bush did this on
purpose to assist military contractors.
But the realization is, we have to come back to our senses. We have
to get back to steady as she goes. We have good guidance of this
country with President Bush. He is doing a remarkable job under these
kinds of circumstances. He is leading this country in a time of war,
and he is fully and completely focused. Dick Cheney is completely and
fully focused in responding to the President. Condoleezza Rice is fully
aware, as the national security adviser; Colin Powell, as our Secretary
of State. I could go through all the list of names.
We have probably the most experienced team by far anywhere in the
world in a government and military structure protecting this country
over any other country in the world, but it still has some holes in it.
So we can talk about how we patch the holes, but in the process of
doing that, in the process of figuring out how to get our goose to lay
a better egg, we do not pull the goose's neck off.
So this is the point, that I think we are well prepared, and I think
we have had a good discussion this evening. I might add, I would ask if
the gentleman has any concluding remarks. Our time is narrowing.
Mr. KINGSTON. Let me say that this House has taken a lot of action on
a bipartisan basis to try to analyze 9/11, some of it that is
appropriate to have in the open, and some of it is secret. It has been
bipartisan. It has also been bicameral.
But we, Members of Congress, Democrats and Republicans, we want to
avoid any possible terrorism, not just America but anywhere in the
world. So it is in all of our interests at this time to keep the
shoulders to the grinder and to fight this war in a unified manner, and
keep the partisan politics in a back room somewhere and let us just get
this job done.
Mr. McINNIS. I might say to the gentleman, take a look since last
Thursday when this media circus began, take a look at how much time
President Bush and his staff and his intelligence organization, our
country's intelligence organization, take a look at how much time they
had to devote to rebutting some of the allegations that were implied by
the minority leader of this House.
Look how much time was devoted from our national leaders to address
these kinds of headlines. This is exactly what our enemy wants to see
us do. They want to see us so confused within our own government. They
want to see us like Siamese fighting fish, fighting each other within
our own government. That is exactly what happened over this last
weekend.
We can bet that the President of the United States, instead of having
his full attention focused on the war and on the possible threats
against this country, they had to prepare for talk shows on Sunday,
they had to defend themselves, and they had to get all of their staff
to spread them out to talk to the media to try and defend themselves,
that our President did not have knowledge prior to September 11 that
this country was going to receive a surprise attack that killed 3,000
people.
Let me conclude with this. I dare any of my Democratic colleagues, I
challenge them, any of them, I challenge my Republican colleagues, I
challenge anybody in America, show me one elected official today that
would take information, knowing that one of the most horrible events in
the history of this Nation was going to occur, and they would sit on
it. Show me one. It does not exist.
So before any of my colleagues go out there and make the implication
or the allegation or the outright statement that the President of this
country, who has done a tremendous job in his leadership as a result of
September 11, show me, just show me one time where any of these people
would have gone out and in effect have been a traitor to the country.
It does not exist. We all care about the security of this Nation. It is
incumbent upon us to provide for the security of the people of this
country, and we are doing the best job we can.
If we can improve our job in a constructive fashion, I am all for it.
Last week, instead of contributing to or initiating the media circus,
in my opinion, the minority leader maybe even could have called the
President himself and said, Mr. President, I do not want to go out and
talk to the media implying you knew something prior to September 11.
How can I help?
{time} 2030
That phone call did not take place, and that is what ought to be
happening. Instead of making our President spend an entire weekend
trying to defend this position, we should have had our President
spending the entire weekend doing what he was going to do, and that was
focus on the immediate needs of all of the citizens of the United
States instead of having to focus on political defense strategy
throughout the weekend.
I will yield to my colleague but would advise we are probably down to
the last few minutes.
Mr. KINGSTON. Mr. Speaker, I wanted to say we have heard so much from
the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Gephardt), Senator Daschle, and the
partisans about the August 6 memo; but there was not a warning in there
and it was not a threat report. What it was it was an analysis of al
Qaeda and Osama bin Laden, and it talked in general terms about the
threat that they posed to general world problems; and they did not
mention anything about using aircraft as missiles. It did say they
could hijack a plane, but up until then no one had used an airplane as
a missile.
So all of this stuff sounds really great for Senator Daschle and the
Democratic National Committee to sit around and say this is what they
[[Page H2647]]
should have done, but the reality is nobody knew this information. But,
again, if he wants to criticize President Bush; let him attack him for
health care, Social Security, whatever, but a war effort while we have
soldiers on the ground and a very unstable situation in the Middle East
with our ally, Israel, is very poor judgment, not just bad politics but
poor judgment.
Mr. McINNIS. The gentleman agrees with me there is something to be
learned by September 11. We have learned a lot of things, whether it
the design of our skyscrapers, what we could have done to assist our
firefighters and our policemen more, maybe what we could have done for
our fighter jets that scramble out there. There are lots of things we
could learn from that. That was not the effort that was being made on
Thursday. It was not an approach that said let us get together and
figure this out. Maybe put our minds together and think out what
constructively we could do to improve the situation.
Instead, it was a very targeted attack on the President of the United
States alleging or implying or outright saying the President of the
United States had knowledge prior to September 11 that would have
allowed us to avoid September 11. That did not exist. And there is not
anybody in these Chambers that had that kind of information. And to the
best of our knowledge only the hijackers and bin Laden and his
organization knew what was going to happen on September 11.
If we come together as a team, we can continue to put together or
march forward to do, again, what was our number one calling. And our
number one calling is to provide for the security and the protection
and safety of the people of the United States of America.
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